Rumsfeld Bible Quotes

Apparently, a lot of people who use Yahoo! are searching for "Rumsfeld bible quotes" today. This rather odd happenstance is apparently a function of a story that circulated earlier in the week about Rumsfeld putting bible verses on the cover sheets of "Worldwide Intelligence Updates" intended for President Bush.  Apparently, the story is largely untrue.

Better Vicar than Wicca?

I see via Andrew Sullivan that secularist Andrew Stuttaford argues that atheists should bring their children up in a relatively innocuous church lest they wind up choosing a more radical faith on their own: Belief in a deity (or deities), and the desire to worship it or them, is an almost universal aspect of human nature. This not something that can be ...

The Pope Picks Our Ambassadors Now?

I glossed over yesterday's news that the Vatican blocked Caroline Kennedy's appointment as U.S. ambassador for a variety of reasons.  Regular commenter Tlaloc emailed me, though, making a good point: [T]he Vatican refuses to accept any ambassador who is not explicitly pro-life including anti-ESC research (such as Doug Kmiec).  Various voices on the right have praised them for this principled stand. ...

Bow? Wow!

The conservative media and blogs have been having a field day parsing the bow that President Obama gave before Saudi King Abdullah in London last week. Some see it as a sign that he is submitting in fealty to Saudi Arabia. Others find 'coded messages' about how the US will submit to Islam. His act stirs up the canard that ...

Evangelical Collapse Damned Unlikely

Michael Spencer, a self-evowed evangelical Christian, predicts the end of his kind. We are on the verge – within 10 years – of a major collapse of evangelical Christianity. This breakdown will follow the deterioration of the mainline Protestant world and it will fundamentally alter the religious and cultural environment in the West. Within two generations, evangelicalism will be a house deserted ...

Why Mormons Aren’t Christians

In a long essay, E.D. Kain defends his assertion that "Mormons are not, by any definition of the word, Christian."  A brief excerpt: Mormons are no more Christian than Rastafarians are, regardless of their Coptic heritage. Nor are members of the Baha’i faith Muslim, despite their roots in Islam, and despite the fact that many of them believe in Muhammad ...

Major Reforms in Saudi Arabia

Saudi King Abdullah announced a major shake-up in his government over the weekend. Among the changes was the naming of the first woman to a high government office, Deputy Minister for Girls' Education. The promotion of a woman in a country that generally treats women as second class citizens is indeed a big step. More interesting--and important--were changes he made in ...

God and Natural Disaster

Heather Mac Donald asks, Will Bill O’Reilly or anyone else who saw the hand of God in the safe landing of US Airways Flight 1549 this January please explain why God chose not to save Continental Connection Flight 3407, which plunged into a house outside of Buffalo last night, killing all 49 people on board and a resident on the ground? She ...

Catholic Church Revives Practice of Indulgences

The New York Times reports that the Catholic Church has begun reviving the practice of indulgences under Pope Benedict XVI.Like the Latin Mass and meatless Fridays, the indulgence was one of the traditions decoupled from mainstream Catholic practice in the 1960s by the Second Vatican Council, the gathering of bishops that set a new tone of simplicity and informality for ...

So, Has Rev. Warren Become Muslim?

I don't think I'm the only one who noticed that during his invocation, Rev. Rick Warren used the phrase, "You, the merciful one; You, the compassionate one'. That phrase, the heart of the bismillah, was not accidental, I believe. The bismillah is the prayer that is used to start nearly anything done by a pious Muslim, even appearing at the top ...

Can We Just Ban Them and Be Done With It?

I tell you these Nanny State types really are grating. Now it isn't just second hand smoke, but third hand smoke. What is third hand smoke? That smell from people that have just had a cigerette. That is apparently a super duper deadly toxic brew of chemicals that can KILL!!! Run!!!! Third-hand smoke is what one ...

Virginity Pledges Don’t Work, Except When They Do

MSNBC is touting the results of a new government funded survey under the headline: "Study: Teenage 'virginity pledges' are ineffective" and the subhead, "Youths who promise abstinence are also less likely to use protection." The new analysis of data from a large federal survey found that more than half of youths became sexually active before marriage regardless of whether they had ...

The Muslims are Coming!

The Muslims are quietly taking over our banks and imposing Sharia law on our financial system. Would you believe that this is a good thing? Read my New Atlanticist piece, "Islamic Banks Surge, Thanks to Financial Crisis" to see why.

Obama Picks Warren, Angers Gays

[caption id="attachment_28949" align="alignright" width="231" caption="Rick Warren and Barack Obama at Saddleback"][/caption] President-Elect Barack Obama has made the most controversial move thus far in his transition, naming far right televangelist Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at his inauguration.  While this initially struck me as a brilliant move on his part, winning points with Evangelical Christians with little downside, the announcement has ...

Obama Skipped Church for Gym!

Barack Obama blew off going to church yesterday in favor of a workout, a breathless Politico report informs us. President-elect Barack Obama has yet to attend church services since winning the White House earlier this month, a departure from the example of his two immediate predecessors.  On the three Sundays since his election, Obama has instead used his free time to ...